(Newark, NJ) – 92YTribeca and WBGO present The Checkout: Live from 92YTribeca, a new series created by Joshua Jackson, host of WBGO’s hour-long music magazine The Checkout, who is widely recognized as an unparalleled enthusiast for modern expressions in jazz. Curated by Jackson in conjunction with 92YTribeca, The Checkout: Live will convene some of the most exciting and innovative players on the NYC scene for monthly concerts that will be broadcast live on WBGO as well as streamed on WBGO.org. Portions will also be recorded for future broadcast and podcast as part of The Checkout.

The Checkout: Live at 92YTribeca is one part of a comprehensive WBGO programming strategy to expand the audience for a distinct musical culture. “Our message is growing, and so are the ways we can deliver it – on a clear and consistent radio signal, on wbgo.org, and on mobile telephony. We’re excited to work with 92YTribeca to create new opportunities to discover, engage, and build the jazz community,” said Jackson.

The mainstage at 92YTribeca, 92nd Street Y’s downtown cultural venue, regularly features jazz as part of its eclectic offerings, which also include film, performance, visual art and a huge range of musical genres. “92YTribeca is a multidimensional space that was built to support arts across many disciplines,” said Michele Thompson, director of 92YTribeca. “We presented a weekend of Jazz with Jason Moran and friends this winter and were struck by the enthusiasm of the young Jazz audience for both new artists and seasoned masters. We were delighted to meet Josh in that process and recognized a shared vision with WBGO for highlighting innovative artists and introducing their work to a broader audience. 92YTribeca’s capacity for creating a great experience for both artists and audiences, when joined with Josh’s curatorial savvy and WBGO’s reach should provide an ideal forum for this project.” The Checkout: Live at 92YTribeca adds to 92nd Street Y’s expanding broadcast and online offerings, which include satellite broadcasts of its renowned lecture series, as well as content on FORA.tv, iTunesU, the archive at 92Y.org and elsewhere.

The Checkout: Live grows out of Jackson’s weekly broadcast production on WBGO, The Checkout, which was created as a vehicle to discover new music and to reinforce the ideas of currency and immediacy in jazz culture. The Checkout: Live at 92YTribeca, as well as WBGO’s partner series with NPR, Live at the Village Vanguard, gives people multiple opportunities to see, hear, and engage with a live performance – on the radio, online, on mobile devices. Josh Jackson continued, “I’m thankful for the support of WBGO’s senior management and the team at 92YTribeca. Everyone is so committed to increasing the impact and visibility of jazz. We all want to grow the audience for jazz and expand the cultural literacy of people who connect with us. Jazz music never really lost its cool. There’s still plenty of high-quality music being made by a very diverse culture. WBGO takes our mission seriously. As a media organization, our aim is to take jazz presentation to new heights. Musicians take the music to new places all the time. We need to tell that story every way we know how.”

The Checkout: Live series will also be video webcast live and archived at NPR Music (npr.org/music) as part of NPR Music’s ongoing commitment to bring the vibrant jazz scene to a nationwide audience through its website and mobile apps. “We relish this new opportunity to amplify the great work of WBGO and give jazz fans new ways to fall in love with and experience the music,” said Anya Grundmann, NPR Music Director and Executive Producer.

New York City’s hottest new jazz showcase, a living and breathing celebration of the present and future of the music, The Checkout: Live kicks off June 22 with Dan Tepfer and special guest Noah Preminger.

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WED, JUNE 22

The Checkout: Live From 92YTribeca Featuring An Evening With Dan Tepfer and special guest Noah Preminger
$12 adv / $15 day of
7:30pm doors, 8:00pm show TICKETS

Dan Tepfer is a New York-based pianist and composer and one of the most formidable jazz musicians on the international stage — hailed as “brilliant” by The Boston Globe, “remarkable” by The Washington Post, a “player of exceptional poise” by the New York Times, “a singular voice” by Libération (France). “Tepfer eschews jarring dissonances, gratuitous clusters or poundings,” raves DownBeat magazine. “He has the ability to disappear into the music as he’s making it.” Tonight at 92YTribeca, he will present three sets of music – solo, duo and with his trio.

Saxophonist Noah Preminger has been receiving stellar recognition almost immediately since he hit the jazz scene. Ben Ratliff of the New York Times raved about Preminger’s debut release, Dry Bridge Road: “More than just a promising starting point, this is a display of integrity; here’s a musician you feel you can trust….” Preminger released his second recording, Before the Rain, in January.

“By definition the bass player is a pivotal figure in jazz, a steward of tonality as well as tempo. Determining a good one can require close listening: that quality reveals itself in the cohesion of the band as well as in the handling of line and phrase. All of this was accounted for in Mr. Williams’s set, which also involved a pair of harmonically sound original compositions and a balance of tradition and novelty.” -Nate Chinen, New York Times

Washington, DC-born, New York-based bassist Ben Williams’ is celebrating the release of his debut album State of Art out on Concord Jazz. The album is a result of Williams’ first prize in the 2009 Thelonious Monk International Competition for double-bass. Recently, Williams has been touring with vibraphonist Stefon Harris & Blackout, a R&B and hip-hop-tinged group, which calls on Williams’ unique connection with go-go, from his native Washington, DC to inform its sound and pianist Jacky Terrasson’s Trio. State of Art marks Williams’ first album as a leader and features tenor/soprano saxophonist Marcus Strickland, guitarist Matthew Stevens, keyboardist Gerald Clayton, drummer Jamire Williams (who also appeared with the bassist on Terrasson’s Push) and percussionist Etienne Charles, joined on three tracks by alto/soprano saxophonist Jaleel Shaw.

Since his arrival in New York in 1996, Pedro Giraudo has performed and recorded in a wide variety of musical projects and prominent ensembles, ranging from tango to jazz, in addition to his own Pedro Giraudo Jazz Orchestra. He has collaborated with 9-time Grammy® award winner Paquito D’Rivera, Grammy® award winner Pablo Ziegler, Latin American icon Ruben Blades, as well as with Branford Marsalis, Kenny Garrett, Regina Carter, among many others and has performed in venues such as The Blue Note (Japan & USA), Birdland (Austria & USA), Kennedy Center (Washington DC), Iridium, Jazz Standard, Jazz Gallery, Blue Note, Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall (NYC). His latest CD, his fifth, is titled Córdoba — the name of his home city and province in Argentina— released in June 2011 on the ZOHO Music label.

Eric Du’sean Harland, composer and drummer, is a native of Houston, Texas who was discovered by Wynton Marsalis during a workshop in high school. Since then, Eric has gone on to record and perform with countless jazz greats including McCoy Tyner, Terence Blanchard, Kenny Garrett, Ravi Coltrane, the late, great Betty Carter, Joe Henderson, Charles Lloyd, Joshua Redman, Wynton Marsalis, and John Patitucci to name a few. In ‘DownBeat’s, 65th Annual Readers Poll’, Eric made it on the short list of world recognized drummers along with Elvin Jones and Roy Haynes.

“Marcus Strickland has started to turn heads in the most thriving but most competitive jazz scene on the planet …his tone: liquid and luminous, yet forceful and exact.” -Thomas Conrad (JazzTimes Magazine)

Saxophonist Marcus Strickland was named ‘Rising Star on Tenor Saxophone’ in Downbeat Magazine’s Critic’s Poll ‘10, ‘Rising Star on Soprano Saxophone’ in Downbeat Magazine’s Critic’s Poll ‘08 and ‘Best New Artist’ in JazzTimes Magazine’s Reader’s Poll ‘06, he also placed third in the 2002 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition. He has toured internationally with his own Trio/ Quartet and the bands of Dave Douglas Keystone, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Roy Haynes, making Strickland a household name among the world’s renowned jazz saxophonists. His latest recording, Triumph of the Heavy, Vol. 1 & 2, is expected to be released by summer 2011.

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TUES, SEPT 27

The Checkout: Live From 92YTribeca Featuring Erik Friedlander’s Bonebridge Band and Tillery (Becca Stevens, Gretchen Parlato, and Rebecca Martin)
$12 adv / $15 day of
7:30pm doors, 8:00pm show TICKETS

Bonebridge is cellist Erik Friedlander’s new band and it turns to the American South for inspiration. Taking a cue from his teenage passion for The Allman Brothers Band and Johnny Winter, Friedlander brought in slide-guitar player and Memphis native Doug Wamble to share the front line of this new quartet. The music is inspired by the chemistry between the cello and the slide guitar–the two instruments are kindred spirits when played in this fresh new context. Wamble joins a honed unit as Friedlander, Mike Sarin (drums) and Trevor Dunn (bass) have played together in New York City for years, most recently in the Broken Arm Trio. Cellist Erik Friedlander is a composer, an improviser, and a veteran of NYC’s downtown scene. His compositions and his improvising style attempt to blend the traditions of classical and popular music styles with an always evolving vision of what a cellist can be pushed to accomplish.

The North Carolina-bred, New York-based singer/composer/guitarist’s status as a lifelong music-maker is more than apparent on the Becca Stevens Band’s latest release Weightless. Although she’s already won significant acclaim for her membership in Travis Sullivan’s Bjorkestra and her prestigious collaborations with such esteemed musicians as Taylor Eigsti and Brad Mehldau, the new album reveals the accomplished young songstress to be a startlingly original talent in her own right. Stevens’ work has already received praise from The New York Times, who described her as “a best-kept secret” and called her debut indie release Tea Bye Sea “impressively absorbing.” The Boston Phoenix noted Becca’s “big voice and no-bull—- emotional delivery.” The Winston-Salem Journal stated, “Stevens’ singing is remarkable, soulful, pitch-perfect and subtle in its controlled acrobatics…and her acoustic songs boast musical textures and colors that embrace the adventurism of jazz.”

About WBGO

Founded in 1979, Newark Public Radio, Inc. is a publicly supported cultural institution that champions jazz at WBGO 88.3 FM in Newark, New Jersey and worldwide via wbgo.org. WBGO is the recognized world leader in jazz radio and one of the most respected jazz presenters in the country, and offers award-winning news and innovative children’s programs. Beyond reaching 400,000 weekly listeners (including 17,000 contributing members) on air, online and via mobile devices, WBGO presents live broadcasts from prestigious jazz venues and produces acclaimed programs for NPR heard by millions. WBGO is Jazz Week magazine’s 2010 Major Market Station of the Year.

About 92YTribeca

92YTribeca is 92nd Street Y’s downtown arts and culture venue in New York City. Opened in October 2008, 92YTribeca presents music, comedy, film, theater, talks, classes, family events, and Jewish community and holiday programs in a versatile, street-level, modern space at 200 Hudson Street. In addition to the mainstage and screening room, the venue houses an art gallery, lounge, bar, café, seminar and meeting rooms, and free Wi-Fi around the space. With programs developed by a professional curatorial team in partnership with staff, local artists and arts organizations, new-media companies, fellow presenters, and community and cause-based organizations, 92YTribeca aims to engage a diverse community of young people from around the New York area with smart, relevant programming that encourages participation and conversation. For more information, visit www.92YTribeca.org.